I'm very sorry to hear of Ray's passing.  My work as a marine engineer
took me to San Francisco in the 1980s.  I phoned Ray, and he said
"come on over" so I traveled on the BART, then caught the bus to his
place in Oakland.  After a couple of visits or so, he said he would
come and pick me up at the BART station.

He was hard to get to know at first -- I don't blame him for that --
then once you were his "friend" you got the good treatment.

I purchased 88-note rolls and long play rolls, then style "O" rolls.
I was in the process of making my own "O" rolls and he said I should
sell these.  He made an arrangement with Play-Rite and, being both
a wholesaler and retailer, Ray did good business for me, as in the
1980s many people were still 'around' from the older "era" as well.

Ray sent many rolls of all kinds to retailers around the USA, so
I figured he was a combination of both wholesaler and retailer, and
he was good at it, indeed.  Sometimes he did pack other 'goodies' in
the roll boxes as other people have also noted.

I phoned him quite often, the last time about eight months ago, and
he would keep me on the phone a long time.

He once said to me, recalling the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake in San
Francisco when it damaged the Oakland/San Francisco double-deck bridge,
that one of his cats near him acted strangely and did a "dance" a few
minutes before the earthquake struck.

There will not be another like Ray, for sure!

Steve Bentley
Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada